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Topic: The Never-Ending Story

So here's an idea I tried several years ago on another site that I thought I'd try here. The idea is, I lay out the premise and you, the member, create your own story within it, using your own characters, timeline, etc. The goal is to keep your story going for as long as you possibly can, hence the title, The Never-Ending Story.

Any member can jump in at any point. Members are perfectly welcome to combine their stories or lend their characters to another member (like a guest-star -- just be sure to get the member's permission first!).

There is one rule: no overly-long entries. Huge chunks of text are a chore to read through entirely, and you don't want readers skimming past your entries because you just wrote fifty lines worth of text without a break in between.

That's it. Your story can involve as many characters as you like, can include as many sub-plots as you like so long as you work within the basic premise. And on that note...

THE PREMISE: On January 1st, 2014, the earth passes through a mysterious cloud of unknown origin. Half the global population instantly drops dead and within moments return as drooling, shambling, flesh-craving zombies. They call it D-Day (they're not very creative -- just roll with it). The kicker is that your main character, AND ONLY YOUR MAIN CHARACTER, is completely immune to the zombie plague (though that doesn't mean they can't die).

Re: The Never-Ending Story

(Mexico city) Day one of D-Day: 6:13 PM - It is the first day of the new year. His feet and muscles are aching from a long days work. Normally, Jose takes the day off to recover from the previous nights festivities. Not this year. His family could use the extra money. Jose, readies to board the always crowded bus for his long ride home. Looking up into the sky, Jose notices a dark, dusty looking haze. " Probably a dust storm approaching, he thinks?" Jose finds a place to stand on the bus as it pulls away, and all he can think of is: a hot meal, and a soothing cold drink for his parched throat....

Re: The Never-Ending Story

So weird you opted for a Latino as your main character, Undie. So did I.

DAY 749

Eladio Rivera stared emptily ahead as his Winnebago rattled down a lonely, heat-cracked road somewhere in the Arizona desert. He found his mind wandering to things he'd decided long ago best not to think of. Like Gloria and Nestor. The two most important people in the world to him. And how he'd failed them.

He thought about his life before D-Day. Fifty eight years old and closing in on retirement. He'd bought the Winnie to accommodate Gloria's desire to travel the country while Nestor was off at college. But that day did not come. Will never come. D-Day saw to that. Eladio breathed a sigh of relief when he noticed a rest stop up ahead. Territory to explore, he thought. At least it would take his mind off Gloria and Nestor.

He pulled the Winnie into the rest stop lot and killed the engine. He checked the jerry-rigged wire connecting the battery he kept in his breast pocket to his hearing aid. Then he reached under his seat and retrieved his aluminum baseball bat...

Re: The Never-Ending Story

7 days after d day-

Sam had spent 7 days in his fathers bomb shelter, hiding from the horrors outside. All he knows, is that his mother woke him up a week before and rushed him into the cellar without explained anything; except how much she loved him and how he must stay inside the shelter for as long as possible.

He'd heard things outside his shelter. He heard far off screams and near by shuffling outside his door. He was was clueless about what was happening, but he knew it wasnt good.

7 days had gone by and the supplies left in the shelter were running out fast. Charlie knew he'd have to face the unknown outside. Today, he'll pack the last of his items and venture out....

Re: The Never-Ending Story

Eladio peeked his head out of the Winnebago and scanned for signs of life, dead or undead. Satisfied he was the only one of either there, he stepped out, aluminum bat in hand. His first order of business was to check the vending machines. All empty, save for a single bag of long-expired chips. Someone had already generously shattered the glass, so retrieving them was a cinch. He tucked the chips into his pocket and rounded the rest stop. He nudged open the women's restroom door. Pitch black inside. He produced a pen-light and shone it about. Empty.

He rounded to the men's room. Nudged open the door. Shone the pen-light. He froze as the light found a zombie hanging by a noose from an overhead pipe. From the mid-chest down was empty air, the poor soul having long since been eaten away. Suicide, Eladio thought. The poor bastard either didn't know or didn't care that the noose would deliver him to a very different afterlife than the one he'd likely hoped for.

Eladio noticed a slip of paper protruding from the ragged breast pocket. He plucked it out, indifferent to the zombie itself as it harmlessly chomped its rotted teeth and reached at him with non-existent arms. He unfolded the note and read. "Dios me perdone."

Spanish wasn't Eladio's native tongue. He was American, born and raised. But a youth spent in his immigrated parents' Spanish-speaking household made it easy to translate. "God forgive me."

Eladio respectfully tucked the note back into the zombie's breast pocket. He crossed himself, said a prayer, then reared back his aluminum bat and bashed its fucking head in...

Re: The Never-Ending Story

Re: The Never-Ending Story

(Mexico city) 6:07 PM- Day one of D-Day: Esmerelda, is rolling out a fresh batch of corn tortillas, the pot of pozole is boiling on the stove, her son Benito tending to his daily chores: feeding the chickens & goats in the barn. Her esposo (husband) Jose should be home soon, and hungry as a bear. Esmerelda, experiences a cold tingle that runs down the back of her spine. She shouts out to her son " mijo... Benito... you finished with your chores? Help me clean up the house before your father gets home, and wash your hands."

Jose, gets off the bus to begin his 1/2 mile long trek home. The wind has picked up, blowing even more dust onto his already dry skin. The sky has now become overcast with a strange colored cloudiness, further darkening the landscape. He can see his home up ahead, but just barely, because of the blowing dust and gloom. The thought of food and cold water alone makes him pick up his stride. He picks up a scent. It's like nothing he has smelled before. So strange, so unfamiliar, so foreign... he can only gag when it enters his nostrils, making it's way down his throat. " Ay Dios he mutters." By the time Jose reaches the fencing surrounding his land, he begins to feel sick and dizzy.

Jose awakens. It's pitch dark outside. A churning pain in his gut is present. He heaves up mostly bile, burning his throat and sending sharp pains throughout his body. He calls out to his beloved esposa (wife) Esmerelda...? No answer. Benito... ayuthame (help)! Again, no answer. Jose, ignores the pain. It takes effort, but he wearily manages to stumble towards his home. The front door is ajar. " Esmerelda... Benito?" He notices a some what burning smell. Not the same as the outside air though. A familiar scent. He steps into the threshold of his home, swings open the door, and peers inside. A pot of food sits on a low burning stove; sending small black clouds of smoke into the kitchen area. A covered pile of tortillas sit on the table. " Esmerelda? Benito?" Jose finds a candle to shed some light. He hears a faint shuffling sound, not far away. Walking towards the sound, he begins to quiver. His stomach wrenches in pain, a different kind of pain than previously. He spies around the corner, into his bedroom. Hunched over his wife's body is his young son, Benito. Drenched in blood!

Re: The Never-Ending Story

day 8 after d day- Charlie leaves the shelter

Charlie gathers up the last of his food rations into his backpack, nervous and ignorant of what has happend outside the safety of his shelter. For the past 2 days, he hasnt heard any sounds from afar or nearby, as he did for the first 6 days; which somewhat, sets him at ease. He opens the 4 inch thick door slightly ajar, carefully peeking through the crack. Theres no sign of life. Nothing...

He steps out of his shelter into the cellar and sees it has been ransacked. Debris littered on the cellar floor and shelves torn off the walls. Hes clueless what has happened, yet he has an inkling that what has happened, isnt good. Although it seems calm, he feels its just the eye of the storm.

Charlie knows he need some type of protection. He cant find an obvious weapon, so he grabs a hammer. Cautiously walking up the cellar steps into his kitchen, he thinks of the cold winter that is about to fall upon him. Charlie remembers his fathers advice from past camping trips with his father. So he grabs his fathers old flint stick, swiss army knife, and trenchcoat. He believes hes ready to face the horrors that await....he thinks....

Re: The Never-Ending Story

Eladio sat atop a picnic table wiping his aluminum bat clean of brain matter. Finished, he pulled the chips from his pocket and tried one. Stale, but he was never one to turn down a free meal. As he ate, his view fell upon a merry-go-round in a small play area to the side of the rest stop. How many children had played there, he wondered. And how many children never will. But such thoughts would inevitably lead back to Nestor and his youth, so Eladio tucked away the remainder of his chips and headed back for the Winnebago.

It was then that he heard an odd sound. A distant rattle. Then the growing sound of a rumbling growl. He hurried into the Winnie and locked the door. He snatched up the binoculars he kept in the rear of the vehicle -- along with his other commodities including but not limited to food, water, gasoline and a surprising number of weapons -- and peered down the road.

He saw a vehicle approaching in the distance. As it grew closer it took on the visage of a rusted-out, old-model Ford pick-up. Cow-catcher rigged to its grill topped with bull horns, a Confederate flag waving on its antenna, a steel cage on the back loaded full of supplies. The pick-up cruised into the lot and a pair of dirty rednecks scampered out. Survivors, Eladio thought. Probably spent the last two years on the road, like him.

Eladio pressed his ear to the Winnie's side door. He heard the two men climb out of their vehicle. He heard their heavy, thumping footsteps, and the sound of their stifled, conspiratorial snickering. He nearly lept out of his skin when he heard the knock on the Winnie's door.

"Yoo hoo," one of the voices taunted in a thick, southern drawl. "Anybody home?"

Re: The Never-Ending Story

You don't know anyone who has my problem. It's not a normal problem. It has a medical term for it, though it's rarely used. In fact you'd see it in films more than in real life, perhaps because it is such a rare condition. It's called Frankenstein Syndrome. You guessed it, I'm obsessed with conquering death. This lead to many problems in my life, but right now that's only the beginning of my worries.

You know, at first I was satisfied with just attempting it on bugs. Gently, ever so gently, I would kill them, then I would try to shock them back to life. well at least that's what I hoped to achieve. I would hold a straightened paper clip in an eletrical outlet with a pair of rubber handled pliers, the other tip I would touch to the small dead bug. I had tried all kinds of bugs, worms, ants, spiders, ladybugs, I had tried pouring water on the bugs and shocking them, nothing ever happened, except melt a few outlets. I had to start doing it at school, because my parents were angered about my obsession. Though didn't really know what my obsession really was, they probably thought I was a firebug. Before that I had tried begging and praying them back to life, all to no avail. For you see, I have been afflicted with this disease since as far back as I can recall, and I know not why. Not then, nor even now, have I had a traumatic death in my family. Actually that's not true, but I will get to that later.

Bruce thought of all the conversations slash arguments everyone is having at his horror site. Of course everyone was talking about the weird gas cloud the earth was going to pass through in a few days. Joking bets were made on what will happen when the cloud hit. Bruce really thought nothing would happen, but he bet all his English friends cups of tea that Jimmy would grow to 50 feet tall.

Re: The Never-Ending Story

When I was a child I had been a quiet and shy boy. I remember a day long ago when I was in elementary school. I had been sitting in the back corner of the room, ignored by students and teacher alike, that suited me fine. All day I would sit at my desk, head down, poking and prodding at dead insects with a compass from my geometry kit, hoping that maybe the right poke or prod would jar a reaction out of the dead things. Sometimes if they were fresh enough they would twitch, sometimes even for hours. Those times I would work furiously poking at it hoping it was on it's way back to life. I felt like a doctor, like the ones on TV, he'd knock your knee and your leg would kick, and he'd smile and give you a lollipop. I'd poke the wasps dead body, it's legs would react, I'd smile. I kept notes, I would time how long it would take for the bugs to stop twitching. Each bug had it's own column on my chart of speed tests. I would kill the bug then poke it every 5 seconds and see if it reacted, and record the time of it's last reflexive twitch to my scientific poke. Worms are a tricky one, I could never really tell when they were dead, and in short order I gave up my experiments with them and stuck to legged insects and arachnids. You see even then I was methodical though woefully undereducated for the grand task I was trying to achieve, a task that...

Re: The Never-Ending Story

Good stuff so far, guys. Keep it up!

Eladio was born completely deaf in one ear, and with only 75% hearing in the other. By the time he was six, it was down to 25%. Now, at sixty years old, he couldn't hear a bomb explode in front of him without his hearing aid. And what a hearing aid it was -- a Siemens Motion XCel 501 P, top-of-the-line, bad-ass motherfucker. Retail cost: $1500. Though it didn't cost Eladio a dime. Rather, it had been paid for by the wealthy drunken driver who three years earlier, after having rear-ended Eladio, slipped him two grand cash rather than involve the police.

And today Eladio found the hearing aid particularly useful. It allowed him to hear the rednecks circling the Winnie looking for another way in. It allowed him to hear their hushed whisperings of what they were going to do to whoever was inside once they broke in. It allowed him to hear them circle back to the door. And it allowed him to hear one tell the other, "Try the handle."

Eladio's eyes darted to a light switch by the door. But this wasn't just any light switch. Eladio, who had spent thirty years as a high school janitor and electrician, had made the switch himself. If you were to follow the wiring from the switch, you'd see it ran down the wall, up the floor to the front of the Winnie, through the dash and to the battery, to which it was tightly secured. But what you wouldn't see is that within the wall itself was a second wire, which ran from the light switch to the door handle's locking catch.

Eladio flicked the switch. He couldn't help but grin at the sound his top-of-the-line, bad-ass motherfucker hearing aid picked up -- the sound of one dumb-ass redneck being bombarded with 50 amps worth of Winnebago battery charge...

Re: The Never-Ending Story

Day 78 – Wednesday March 19, 2014

The mission hadn’t gone well. Of the five on the team only he survived. Communication was down. He surveyed the horizon from his vantage point of an abandoned warehouse on the outskirts of Santiago, Chile. He could see it clearly now with his naked eye.

The landing had occurred three klicks from the city center Plaza de Armas. It was exactly eight days after D-Day that it had landed. Massive would be an understatement. Since its arrival there had been no movement from it except for the deep vibration emanating from beneath it and a constant low level hum.

Those who survived D-Day, and there weren’t many, believed that the “Purple Haze” was a precursor to the vessels arrival. Mark Simpson was a science specialist with the CIA working undercover at the US embassy in Caracas, Venezuela on January 1 when the hazing occurred. Pandemonium was putting it mildly. People just dropped dead all around him. And it was a painful and disfiguring death. Wholesale anarchy took hold within forty eight hours. And then the dead started to rise, horribly hunting, killing and eating those who were not already dead.

Some movement below attracted his attention. He checked that the safety was off on the machine gun strapped to his chest.

Re: The Never-Ending Story

...I am getting off course, I know this, you see this is how my mind works, I can't stop thinking of the dead, though in this case I do suppose it serves a point. I was getting at why I had so much time to work on my obsession, and why it went unchecked for so long. So on this particular day I was working away in my corner, my school work long done, though done hastily. Other students either did their work or guffawed and joked with each other. This time the teacher happened to have caught the student in front of me talking in class, and I was too caught up in my work and didn't notice the disruption in the class. She drew near and was going to begin to lecture the boy, when she saw what I was doing. I had pinned a worm to top of desk with the tip of my compass, it hadn't quite died, and flung itself around mercilessly, ravelling and unravelling. She looked revolted. She screamed. I don't know if it was in anger, disgust or terror, but she screamed. All the students looked at me and saw what I had done. That was it, I was ostracized for the rest of my elementary school life. And high school wasn't much better.

Re: The Never-Ending Story

Eladio turned off the switch and listened. He heard the heavy thud of redneck-on-concrete, and his panicked partner's voice asking stupidly if his unconscious pal was okay. Eladio knew he had to seize the opportunity. He grabbed the sawed-off double barrel he kept above the Winnie's door (upon the stock of which Eladio had carved the nickname he'd given the weapon; the same nickname his mother had given him as a child -- "Dulce" -- which was Spanish for "sweet").

Eladio bolted out of the Winnie door, catching the panicked redneck off-guard. He was a big fellow, six and a half feet tall if he was an inch, grime caked under his fingernails. He also had a tattoo on his inner lip which red "pussy licker" -- though Eladio had no way of knowing that. Eladio drew aim on the brute, who quickly dropped to his knees and threw up his hands in surrender.

Fifteen minutes later the titan-esque redneck sat tied back-to-back with his still unconscious partner, watching on with tear-soaked eyes as Eladio dug a grave several feet away. "C'mon, man!" he whimpered. "We was just funnin' around. You can't kill us for that!" Eladio couldn't help but laugh to himself at the sight of this mountain of a man dribbling like a little girl with a skinned knee. "Your little boy's comin' to see you, mama! Oh, god damn heaven help me!" he bawled.

Eladio turned to the redneck, brandishing his shovel. This is it, "pussy licker" thought. This god damn greaser sumbitch is gonna bash my head in. To his surprise, Eladio instead stabbed the shovel into the mound of dirt by the shallow grave, then disappeared into the rest stop men's room. A moment later he exited, carrying what was left of the suicide victim's zombified body by the freshly cut end of the noose still around its neck. Eladio unceremoniously dropped it into the newly dug grave and buried it. Once finished, he ignored the redneck's angry bellowing while stripping his and his partner's pick-up of its supplies. The behemoth especially threw a fit when Eladio punctured all four of the pick-up's tires.

Eladio climbed into the Winnie and shut the door behind him. "Hey!" shouted the redneck. "What the hell are you doing?" Inside, Eladio cranked the ignition. Again the redneck shouted. "You can't just leave us here all tied up and defenseless like this! It ain't human, man! It ain't human!" A moment later Eladio cracked open the door and tossed out a shiny object which landed at the redneck's feet.

"What the hell am I supposed to do with that?" the redneck asked. Eladio shut the door without response, climbed into the driver's seat and drove away, leaving the redneck to stare dumbfounded at the dull butterknife laying at his feet.

(Sorry, this was kind of a long one -- broke my own rule -- won't happen again.)

Re: The Never-Ending Story

A group of six hazers were looking up towards his perch. When the dead started rising, they soon became known as hazers. They were the ones who emerged from the deadly purple haze that enveloped the earth on D-day. Extremely hungry, they searched for living human flesh. They would also eat any living animal they found. And sometimes they would even turn on themselves if hungry enough. Groups of them would often form and hunt together as a pack like wolves. Filthy and stinking of death, they wore threadbare garments from when they were last alive, or some were just bare naked, without even shoes on their torn up feet. Though they no longer had human thought and human emotions, their core animal instincts functioned at a heightened ability.

Mark checked his possible escape routes. He tried to make sure that anywhere he placed himself, there were at least two ways out. He had checked every corner of the two story warehouse when he entered and it was clean of hazers. He did find a couple of box-cutters in the remains of what had been a bottling distribution operation and added them to his dwindling arsenal. During the anarchy of the aftermath of the hazing, little was left that wasn’t destroyed. When his team set off from Caracas to find and report on the mysterious alien vessel that landed on the outskirts of Santiago, they were well armed and supplied. All of them had been immune to the purple haze.

Re: The Never-Ending Story

Loving the last two entries, keep up the good work guys!

The summer before high school started my parents sent me to summer camp. They told me it would be good for me to make friends, that the kids at summer camp would be different than the kids I went to school with. Different in the sense that they were not the same students I went to school with, was true. Different in the sense that they would accept me as one of them, was not. I had begged my parents to let me stay home. Pleaded with them. Bargained with them. I made them deals no sane person would refuse, or perhaps no sane person would offer. Maybe my fervent desire to stay home hardened their resolve. They knew what was best for me, and what was best for me was to go to summer camp. Fine, if that's what they want. Fine. I packed my luggage with my toiletries, clothes, bathing suit, towel, sun screen, bug spray, a pocket knife, a sleeping bag, and three thick volumes loaded onto my smart phone; Heinrich Cornelius Agrippa's Of Occult Philosophy, The Private Diary of Dr. John Dee, and the Epistle of Iohn Pontanus: Containing both the Theoricke and the Practicke of the Philosophers Stone. Readings far beyond my age, but captivating nontheless. I just hoped that the secret to conqueroring death wasn't lost in the translation. My Dad dropped me off at the gates to summer camp. I grabbed my ruck sack and flung it over my shoulder, I slammed the trunk door shut and turned to look at my father pleadingly one last time. He kissed my forehead and assured me camp was fun. I walked through the wooden arch that marked the entrance to summer camp. It had a sign hanging overhead held to the arch by chains, it proclaimed the camps name "Camp Crystal Lake"...

Re: The Never-Ending Story

The only way off the top of the warehouse was through a hatch on the roof deck that led back into the building or jumping down about eight feet onto a steel fire escape, which as he looked toward the alien vessel in the distance, was off the side of the building to his right.

Though the hazers were no longer human, their hunger for flesh drove them to “think” about ways to capture prey. Nobody knew whether they could actually think in the way a person does. They didn’t talk though they did grunt and scream. But they were adept at getting into cars and buildings and finding their way to people who thought they were well hidden. Many that didn’t die from the purple haze and thought they were safely hidden away in their apartments and homes met a grisly death being eaten alive by groups of hazers that hunted and worked together.

He was sure that they spotted him as the group below started pounding on the main entrance door that he had locked after deeming the building safe. They were also grunting louder and becoming more agitated.

He’d already spent two days in the building, one day too many he knew. An employee kitchen in the warehouse still had dry food supplies and he was taking advantage of that. Now he had to decide whether he had time to head back to the kitchen to retrieve the rest of his supplies or just make a run for it off the fire escape.

Re: The Never-Ending Story

...Well not really, I honestly can't remember the summer camp's name, that's how little it mattered to me. One of the few things that I can remember, and quite vividly (fore I have re-read these tomes many times), was reading those three books pertaining to life eternal. They captured my fancy like nothing else since reading Shelley's Frankenstein and studying Sir William Snow's Rudimentary Treatise on Galvanism and the Genereal Principles of Animal and Voltaic Eletricity. Of course later I discovered how outdated these books really were. You would think with the intelligence to read and understand these books I would have the intelligence to realize a book written over a hundred and fifty years ago is out of date, but I didn't. I was to caught up in my own fantasy, and these books fueled it.

By the end of the week at summer camp I had weaseled my way out of most of the activities and had managed to avoid contact with most of the other kids there. I spent most of the time pouring over the ancient tomes, hiding in the shade of trees as old as the books I was reading. I had once convinced a counsellor to give me the WiFi password from the Counsellors Office. I used this to research terms from these old texts that at the time were unbeknownst to me. My knowledge grew, and my thirst for more knowledge grew even more. I had halted my naive experiments temporarily, at least until the day when I felt confident enough in my field of research to achieve results worthy of recording. Though I longed for success, failure was a bitter pill I swallowed rather easily. I hadn't succeed yet and I didn't expect to succeeded soon, but each failure would bring me closer to a universal truth. Or so I hoped.

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Day 365 of D-Day- The memories of his wife and son become more and more distorted with each passing day. The joys and pleasures of his past are long gone. Jose now only lives to find a inner peace that was swept away a year ago, to the day. The day he came home to find his wife ripped to sheds. The day he murdered his own son, Benito.

There are no longer rules in society. Lawlessness is everywhere, and what little police force there was in Mexico prior to D-Day, is now pretty much extinct. Survival, kill -or- be killed, is the new way of life; In a world gone mad. Killing is instinctive, and Jose has long lost count of the lives he has since taken. Man, woman, and child. Once a man who appreciated life, now he has become a lost soul without conscience. The instinct for survival will do that, when all pleasures of life have been stripped away. Jose has read tattered newspapers articles stating that " the dead walk the earth." He has listened to radio broadcasts of preachers saying, " God, has turned his back on mankind for their sins!" He knows not what to believe? Except for the fact that the dead have risen. His faith in God has since diminished.

Armed with a shotgun, 2 six shooters, and a machete; Jose is headed for America. He has family there. A brother who immigrated 11 years ago, now living in Los Angeles. He is hopeful his brother has somehow survived. He is pitted against the reality of his brother actually being alive, and the eventuality of finding only more chaos. He cares not. He has nothing left to lose. As the hazy sun begins to set, Jose finds shelter. He is but maybe a day away from the US border. He must get some sleep before crossing the border.

Re: The Never-Ending Story

He thought to himself “Why did I leave my stuff down there?” But he knew the answer. He was tired of hauling everything that he needed and more with him everywhere he went. He was even questioning why he continued on a mission that was doomed from the start. When he received the assignment to investigate the alien landing, there was still a small semblance of government back home. The agency continued to work, along with some foreign partners. They had jointly sent him on this mission picking up other agents along the way.

He flew from Caracas to Lima, Peru, to pick up the first of his team. Then on to La Paz in Bolivia for agent number two. In flight they heard reports that the hazers were inundating the city of Sao Paolo in Brazil, the next stop. When they landed they lost an agent before he even made it to the private jet they were flying. The small craft had just landed and was taxiing in to pick up the Brazilian team member but hazers were everywhere. There were small military units along segments of the runway in combat with hundreds of hazers. From the cockpit Mark could see his contact trying to make his way through the pandemonium on the airport tarmac. The Brazilian agent was trying to shoot his way to the plane.

Mark had never seen so many hazers working together. The more the agent fired his gun, the more they swarmed in. The Brazilian made it to within 25 meters of the jet before his machine gun jammed. He was instantly overrun by the dead. He fought hard to the very end. Unable to kill himself when his gun jammed, which would have been preferable to being eaten alive, he began trying to bash their heads in with the butt of the rifle. Within moments he was lifted up in the air being pulled from every limb as others tore his clothes off to bite into the living flesh. Blood began to spurt as first an arm was ripped from its socket and then his head was torn off. A hazer drank the blood from the neck as it held the head up by the hair.

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On the second last day at Camp WatchaCallit something happened that would change me from that point forward. The camp counsellers had brought us to the lake to go swimming. I, as usual, sat in the shade avoiding the group activity. Re-reading a segment from John Dee's Private Diary that pertained to the elixir of life. It had been a small segment, and rather vague, but it was there, and it would drive me forth in further research. As I sat in the shade, minding my own business, I heard a great thump and a splash, I looked up to see the faces around me startled in terror. A camp counsellor ran from the shore and dove into the water. "Where is she? Where is she?" he had cried, surfacing for a moment. A kid standing on a floating dock pointed close by, and the young man dove again. This time he resurface with a lifeless blonde girl in his hands. At this point I was transfixed. Himself gasping, he dragged the girl onto the dock and began pumping her chest, he stopped and put his ear to her mouth for a moment and watched her chest, then blew into her mouth. He kept pumping. She didn't move other than the heaves her body made under the counsellors pressing hands. She was surely dead.

Then she wasn't. She was wretching and coughing, sputtering out water, her eyes teary, her drenched hair matted about her face. She was alive, and she was beautiful. I rushed over to their side, and other kids gathered around. The counsellor shooed us away, commanding us to; "give her air". We obeyed, but I did not look away. I was astounded by both the young man who had seemingly returned this girl from death, and this beautiful blonde girl who had returned from the nether. In my eyes she was Persephone herself.